Over the Edge
by Nasu Hasami
Summary: She was a nomad without a home who'd shared his bed on occasion, sometimes, in the past. She'd arrived earlier that evening, prepared to squander a few more days in his company, a few more nights in his bed and see where those lost hours left them. Pseudo-Sequel to One-night Stand. Modern AU. Language and Adult Themes.


**Over the Edge**

**By Nasu Hasami**

* * *

_An almost-sequel to One-night Stand. _

_Your reviews (and favourites) made me do it. _

_I blame you._

* * *

She was a nomad without a home who'd shared his bed on occasion, sometimes, in the past. She'd arrived earlier that evening, prepared to squander a few more days in his company, and waste a few more nights in his bed.

Whenever she was in Hong Kong, now, it seemed that was invariably where she would end up: tucked in beneath him, whispering his name. She didn't have an apartment in the city anymore. She just found her way to him and his bed. She didn't even bother trying to run in the mornings, now.

She stayed. They ate breakfast. It was civilised.

Except on the mornings when they lingered in bed and enjoyed each other instead of enjoying breakfast. Those mornings were far from what Li Shang would call civilised, or tasteful, or convivial.

She'd been his nomad for nearly three years now. Three years of this. Although _this_ particular incident hadn't happened before, not as far as he could recall anyway, although that didn't mean it hadn't ever happened before. He just might not have been able to remember it having ever happened.

He certainly didn't mean for Mulan to sucker-punch him when he egged her on to hit him. Although, what his intentions were in encouraging his girlfriend to assault him were presently a mystery, to both him and her.

Li Shang had taken Fa Mulan to a Wushu class once. But that was years ago — the first week she stayed with him, and as far as he knew, she wasn't formally trained in any martial art. If she had been, Mulan obviously abided by the rule of never speaking of Fight Club.

At first Shang had used the excuse that learning some self-defence would be good for her confidence. Gradually, however, this excuse fell through, and it didn't take Mulan long to discover he forced the façade simply so he could throw her about his living room in a shirtless state, and a pretext (though he wouldn't have needed it if he'd asked her) to have her hands on him at all possible times when they were otherwise unoccupied.

It was a darker shade of grey still as to whether it was her confidence or some misguided heavy petting that had led to Shang's current state. After all, it was his semi-prone form lying on the lounge with a piece of frozen steak smacked onto his face.

'Can I see it?' Mulan asked, her small hands pestering his wound.

She didn't exactly sound upset or concerned. The warmth in her voice was something closer to a sycophantic fascination. She probably just wanted to photograph the blow to his head and post it onto her Weibo account, brag about beating the shit out of some pretentious Red Prince.

'No,' Shang grumbled.

He pressed the frosty lump of meat closer to his skin, shivering slightly at the contact. Her fingers were still poised just beyond his vision. She poked him in the eye in an attempt to pry the Wagyū away.

'It looks bad. Should I call an ambulance? Your eye is bleeding.'

Shang knew it looked bad. The bruise burnt like hell. His face was throbbing, his nose was bleeding, and there might have even been a molar loose in his mouth. Still, he didn't really want to explain to a paramedic how foreplay had resulted with him incapacitated, or how his girlfriend's fist had gained enough momentum and force in its small flight path to nearly render him unconscious.

Nor did he wasn't to explain why he'd encouraged his girlfriend to punch him in the first place.

Then there was the small matter of who his girlfriend was, her identity, and the potential for problems that could result in if anyone recognised her.

'Don't call an ambulance. I'll be fine.'

'Clearly, we both know you're not fine.' She was trying to pull the steak from his face again.

'Can you just leave it alone, Mulan!'

'Okay, but please, give me something to do. I feel really bad, Shang.'

She did feel bad, that at least was obvious. Though, whether it was because she'd injured her lover, or because their first night together in eight months was likely now going to be a sexless one, remained up for debate.

'I have to fly to Chengdu on Tuesday morning. Early.'

'I know,' Shang sighed.

He didn't need reminding that this trip left them with less than thirty hours together. Thirty hours that could have been spent sans Wagyū à la carte.

'And you have your London conference next week. I'm booked out until late September, and that's if everything goes smoothly until then.'

It hadn't taken too long of _this_ for syncing their calendars to have become a thing for Mulan. She was going to hack his phone anyway if he didn't hand it to her, and fill in his blank weekends with her name. It always started the same way. They'd sync themselves with each other. Mulan would steal his phone. She'd sync their calendars and schedule in his free days for more _syncing_. How their relationship had lasted for so long on that basis alone was a mystery. It had been nearly three years to the day from that morning after Su's wedding, when she'd stayed for breakfast instead of running off into the sunrise. Shang had once calculated they'd spent less than a two hundred hours with each other, and most of those hours had been expended in bed.

He never considered any of that time wasted by any means. Neither did she.

'Can you get me some water, and some aspirin?'

'Yep. 'Kay. Top Cupboard, right? In the kitchen? The one I can't reach?'

'Yeah, the effervescent tablets, please.' The swelling in his cheek made it feel like there was more 'F's than there should have been.

Mulan swung round the counter and threw herself up on the bench. She wasn't tall, as much as she was long and lean, she was rather petite but menacing all the same, if she wanted to be. A little bit like a Terrier or a Maltese cross, barking at your ankles and jumping for your throat. Shang had described her to his colleagues as willowy but she was skinnier than that, and she wasn't really tall enough to pull off 'willowy'. Willowy was ambiguous and he needed to keep her ambiguity ambiguous or her right hook might clip him a little lower next time.

His girlfriend returned with an armful of boxes and containers, pitching them onto the coffee table. She ducked back into his kitchen, opened stainless steel door after stainless steel door until the blue glowing lights informed her she'd found his fridge, and then swooped back in with two bottles of Badoit.

She'd laughed at him the first time she'd stayed long enough to share more than breakfast with him. Of course the pretty Red Prince only consumed bottled water, and it was all sparkling too, wasn't it?

Sadly, yes, it was, and imported from France.

The fizzing water now assaulted his mouth as the tablets crackled and dissolved on his tongue.

'Shouldn't you dissolve them in a glass?' Mulan asked, folding her arms and tapping her foot.

Shang was the one with a piece of raw meat stuck on his face. He'd decide how he took his tablets.

'Usually,' he mumbled, stoic despite the pyrotechnics behind his teeth.

She checked her watch. He sighed.

'You've got to go, don't you?'

'I told my contacts I'd meet them at nine, sharp. I don't really want to leave you alone like this, but I don't have a cell number I can ring or anything —'

'Go,' he said resolutely, shooing her towards the door with his steak free hand. 'Go. Go and meet with your contact. Just come home when you're done. I'll still be sitting here, still feeling sorry for myself.'

She kissed his head then scampered off. As she stole his keys she blew him another kiss, pouted a little, and then disappeared out the door, slamming it shut in her wake. She returned for her handbag less than two minutes later, kissed him again, and slammed the door with a resounding thud.

For three years they'd had this ridiculous relationship, Shang mused, staring at the ceiling and his bespoke light fittings. Mulan would flap into his life, they'd have dinner, they'd go to bed, (sometimes they'd skip dinner), there'd be some more dallying in bed, they'd sleep — eventually — and she'd still be there when he woke up, mostly, unless there was an early flight that separated them. If that was the case, there was always a note left for him on his bedside table.

Sometimes they'd meet at a prearranged destination amidst standing travel plans. Shang was particularly fond of the weekend they'd wasted in Morocco nearly a year ago. He got a kind of sick satisfaction that his father's company had paid for a hotel room he never used. Mulan's hotel had a better view anyway. That, and no one ever recognised him at any of the hotels she used.

He'd decided to propose to her after that weekend. Not that he knew exactly how they would be married, or if they could. She was a fugitive from the Mainland and he was the heir to Li Enterprises Limited. Not to mention he hadn't actually introduced her to his parents yet, and wasn't too hopeful for how that would proceed when he was brave enough to face it. His mother would probably have a stroke when he told them he wanted to marry a criminal, and that he'd sort of been shagging her for about five years. And if they did manage to become husband and wife, Mulan would have to do a better job with her syncing, not simply scanning for the odd weekend they were both free.

He fell asleep with that thought swimming in his head. Mulan, his lovely, tiny, skinny wife, and her sharp right hook, all his, from then on. Hopefully.

He may not have fallen asleep though. It could have actually been the concussion taking over. The one he'd been valiantly fighting since he tricked his girlfriend into slugging him in the face.

* * *

This was precisely why Fa Mulan didn't date. _This_. This reason. The half-dead man on the couch. She didn't need this in her life. This moaning and groaning and _oh god he was handsome wasn't he_? Even if he was half-dead. And that was her fault anyway. She kissed him until his face turned blue. His eyes popped open as he gasped for air, looking around; looking stunned and drowsy still.

'Did you pass out on the lounge?' she asked innocently. He remained looking a little dazed as his eyes searched the room.

'Must of,' Shang mumbled, sitting up and peeling the now defrosted beef from his cheek. He smelt sickly-sweet of raw meat. The smell made him throw up a little in his mouth. 'Yeah, think so.'

'Good thing I actually did National Service,' Mulan grumbled to herself as she pulled him to his feet. 'Come on soldier; let's get you cleaned up and into bed.' She prodded the tender part of his face, despite his grimacing and flinching. 'It doesn't look so bad now, Shang. It's only red—not purple—and the swellings gone down.'

'Great.'

'My meeting went well, if you care. I'm guessing you don't by the dumb look on your face. They've got a few dates in mind. We could meet up again in October. You'd like that I think: if I was yours for nearly a month. You could tell your colleagues I'm real, not imaginary, and I might even commit to a business dinner with you to prove it to them. I'm fairly certain they think you're probably working too hard and that you've created this whole romance.'

'I see you're hacking my iPad now?'

'You know I go through your emails, honey.'

'Ling thinks you're make-believe. He thinks I had one too many Manhattans that night, passed out, and made you all up. I don't even have a photo of you proving you exist.'

'Deal with it.'

'I do. I told them you couldn't have any photos released that your publicist didn't approve. It sounds better than, _Oh, yes, you can find her by a quick internet search. Both her criminal record and mug shot are available online._'

'Well, that's almost true, about the publicist thing.' Mulan shrugged. 'I'll put something hideously inappropriate on your phone when you're asleep, something that you'll be too embarrassed to show them. Unequivocal evidence you're definitely in a relationship, and that that relationship definitely involves sex.'

'If you're insinuating that you're going to _sext_ me, please don't. I have a reputation to maintain.' He had slumped into the landing wall. The stairs, it seemed, were too great a feat for present endeavours, and much too great for his esteemed reputation to contemplate. 'I don't need my face on tabloids in social columns saying I've succumbed to soliciting pornographic photographs from some unknown temptress.' Shang continued panting, drooping slowly to the floor. 'Can you get me another two aspirin?'

Mulan disappeared, returning moments later with more Badoit and a white container.

'The contact,' she started then stopped, twisting her hands together and knotting her fingers nervously. 'The contact I met with tonight, Shang, it wasn't actually a contact. You see, I know our fathers were Red Guards together, and I know—well I thought I knew—that my dad had helped your dad get to Hong Kong, which he had, but I didn't know that my dad, well, he was—or is, rather—still in contact with your dad. And, so, you know, my dad talks about me to his friends, and he mentioned me to this Cantonese friend of his, one Anthony Li, about how I had a Cantonese boyfriend, a businessman…'

'Are you trying to insinuate that you met with my parents?'

Badoit dribbled across the parquet flooring of the landing, pooling across the smooth surface.

'We had dinner. It was very…_polite_.'

Shang was still just staring at her. He popped three more aspirin in his mouth and swallowed them dry.

'Your mum was very…_expected_. She was a bit forward though. Told me she wanted grandchildren but that I looked too thin for a pregnancy scandal.' At this Mulan rubbed her taught stomach, examining it a little. 'Emelia didn't think you'd get messed up with someone like me unless I was pregnant to you.' She pouted a little, again. 'Despite who my father might have been, apparently, I'm just some ingrate that should be locked up. I don't think she understood that I speak French as well as I speak English.'

_Oh, shit. She had met his mother._

'I love you. I don't think she understood that.'

Mulan said it with such a simple shrug that Shang froze up a little. It was the first time, as far as he could recall, that Mulan had ever said she loved him.

He told her all the time because it annoyed her, especially if she was brushing her teeth or just out of the shower. But it was the first time he'd heard her say it.

_Oh, shit. Oh, shit._

'I'm not going to risk my life like this for anyone. And I haven't, before. I was a virgin when I met you, at that bar, five years ago. It's certainly not how I planned for the first time to go, but I wouldn't change it. And we have this, whatever it is; we have us. We're worth it, I think.'

_Oh, shit. Oh, shit. __Oh, shit._

Mulan looked at him funnily, bending to his height and folding her hands over his knees.

'You all right, Shang? You look like you're tripping? How many of those things have you taken?'

_Oh, shit. Oh, shit._ _Oh, shit. __Oh, shit. Oh, shit._

He tried to calculate the tablets in his head but the numbers all jiggled and morphed together. Two with the steak; another one when he woke up earlier, though it might have been two; three more when she handed the bottle to him; another few when she mentioned his mother…his fingers were fast unscrewing and screwing on the lid.

He didn't want to propose to her here, on the landing, smelling of stale meat with water spilt on the floor and the taste of vomit in his mouth. It was supposed to happen in December, in Macau, in a hotel with a spa suite and an imported bottle of Krug Clos d'Ambonnay. But it was there, swollen on his tongue, trying to escape.

'What is it?' she asked as she leaned closer, her hands on his thighs now; 'Shang, what's wrong?'

He shook his head, eyes intent on the bottle in his hands. She lifted his chin so she could look at him, smiling gently as she patted his puffy cheek. He shook his head again, afraid to meet her gaze and look beyond it.

'You want to say something.'

'Not like this.'

She looked affronted, her hands falling away.

'What's that supposed to mean?'

He stuttered.

What if she did what women usually do and jumped to conclusions? She'd assume he was trying to break up with her, mumbling something like that in this situation. He needed to clear things up with her before that happened. Oestrogen did strange things to eardrums.

'I don't want to, not like this. I had a plan, and it was a great plan. But I want to, like this. It's there, right now, and I'm really trying, Mulan, really, I am. But I want to, like this. I want this. I want us. A lot.'

She carefully took the bottle away from his hands.

'How about you go up to bed? Maybe you need to sleep it off.'

She dragged him up the stairs and helped him onto the bed. He fell asleep not long after, a little melancholic and a little annoyed that he had work tomorrow and that she'd be gone, most likely, by the time he got home. He didn't appreciate that aspect of this relationship. Not really. Not the endless flights and secrecy. Was it really such a terrible thing for him to take a photo of her into the offices and sit it on his desk, and tell his colleagues and his clients that this was his beautiful girlfriend, the one that he loved and wanted to marry?

Yes, apparently, it was.

Shang was delayed at work on Monday night, as he suspected he'd be with a conference call. The technology might have been fantastic compared to where the technology had been three years before, but technology couldn't change his client's time zone. By the time he finally pulled into his driveway he knew Mulan wasn't inside the house. It was that feeling, the knowing that lovers have. A different kind of loneliness had settled over his home; a loneliness that was the void where she stood, and where she belonged. It was nearly midnight. He knew she wouldn't be there. But he'd hoped she would. Hoped, foolishly, that she'd skipped her flight and her next assignment for him. But she wasn't inside, and she hadn't skipped anything for him. She was on her way to Chengdu, or wherever 'Chengdu' had been code for by now.

* * *

It was early on Tuesday morning when Shang's cell pinged to life. The pinging went off before his alarm did, and loudly too. It was a message from an unknown number. The sun wasn't even peeking through his curtains yet.

_"Have arrived safely. Thought I would let you know. This is my number, now. It's me, by the way, your girlfriend, the one that you should probably have charged with battery or assault."_

Shang sat up and propped the pillows behind him, rearranging himself on the bed. His fingers were slow and lethargic, slipping across the screen messily. Mentally, he noted the ungodly time. "_How was your flight?_"

Mulan: _Turbulent. Nearly died over the Siberian hinterland. LOL. I'm not telling you where I am. Flight was fine. How did your conference call go?_

Shang: _Fine. Will have to do a formal meet and greet in New York within a month. My secretary now believes you are real, though._

Mulan: _Because I answered the home phone when you rang?_

Shang: _Yes._

Mulan: _I can answer it like that any time, Gorgeous._

Shang: _No you can't—most of the time you're not here to answer it like that. Ms Huang was very apologetic towards me about that meeting being rescheduled without my notice. Apparently you sounded very disappointed that I wouldn't be home for dinner. Huang thought I was going to fire her._

Mulan: _It was dessert that I was concerned about._

Shang: _Really. This does not surprise me. Figures you'd only be thinking of your stomach._

Mulan: _That weekend is the first time we've been together since we've been together that there has been no dessert._

Shang: _No. It's the second._

Mulan: _Pardon?_

Shang: _When I literally bumped into you in Vancouver last year. We didn't have dessert then._

Mulan: _Yes, we did._

Shang: _No, we didn't._

Mulan: _I distinctly remember a Jacuzzi being involved in that incident._

Shang: _There was a Jacuzzi involved but there was no dessert._

Mulan: _I think you've been popping more of those pills. There was definitely dessert._

Shang: _We are talking about the same thing aren't we—Dessert as a euphemism? I'm starting to think you are talking about your stomach and the Crème Brule you wanted to keep ordering from room service that I said was unnecessary._

Mulan: _You did things to me in that hot tub._

Shang: _Yes, but there was no dessert._

Mulan: _I definitely had dessert. How do you even count that as no dessert? You definitely had something too._

Shang: _Apart from you, no, I didn't._

Mulan: _That's all you need, though. Me. Nothing else. That's what you said, two nights ago, when you were drunk on pills, and babbling on the landing._

Shang: _I love you._

Mulan: _So you keep telling me._

Shang: _I have to get out of bed and have a shower._

Mulan: _Think of me when you do. I always enjoy our showers, even if they are a little pointless._

Shang: _Very pointless._

Mulan: _That spa in Macau?_

Shang: _Yes!_

Mulan: _We need to get a spa._

Shang: _Definitely. Yes. Will look into this later today._

Mulan: _Though it would be very pointless._

Shang: _Perfectly pointless. How am I supposed to go to work like this, woman, you should be here, next to me…being my dessert._

Mulan: _Check your photo albums on your phone. I added a new one. Non-descript. But it's all me._

Shang: _So you're sexting me now?_

Mulan: _I can sext you after I get to my hotel, if you want. I'm wearing that basque you bought me. The red one._

Shang: _I need to get up and shower. I'll be late for work if I just keep lying in bed messaging you. I'll never get there if you start virtually harassing me._

Mulan: _I thought you were the boss?_

Shang: _That doesn't mean I can do whatever I want, dear. I have to think of the shareholders._

Mulan: _Okay. Will stop responding now. Have a good day. Am sending you a big good morning kiss, Mr Boss-Man. Love you._

Shang: _You can keep texting, I might just be delayed in my responses._

Mulan: _Okay. Check your laptop satchel before you go. I left something in there for you—something for your desk. Love you. XXX._

Shang smiled as he flicked back over to his home screen and opened up his photo albums. Sure enough there was a new folder with about two hundred photos in it. Mulan had photographed herself nondescriptly, as she'd said, but he knew it was her. It was her fingers and her toes. She had photographed her ankle, the left one, from various angles. She had photographed her right knee. She had photographed her clavicles, still spotted with red marks made by his mouth. She had photographed her nose and her eyes and her lips. But there was no photo of her face, just bits of her face. Photos of her ears, and her neck, and her shoulders; a few photos that made him blush and definitely fell into the sexting category, but nothing that could actually identify her as her. He knew the photos were her though, especially the one of her bra. He'd recognise those breasts anywhere if he saw them.

He texted her a photo of his wrist as he drank his coffee and ate his breakfast. About an hour later he received a 'LOL' in reply, then, 'This one', and a link to a webpage specialising in luxury spa baths.

Needless to say, Shang ignored the paperwork associated with his New York client that morning while he researched Jacuzzis. His secretary left him alone in spite of the importance of the phone calls she should have switched through. She still feared facing dismissal a little. And Ling made no further comments about his fantasy romance when he noticed the shiny silver frame on the CEOs desk, later that day. The photo encased within pictured a petite woman on a bed, wearing nothing but the shirt Shang tended to wear on Fridays, wrapped in the CEO's bare arms, sheets pooled about them. The usually stoic, plain faced Businessman looked almost happy with that petite thing held tightly within his arms.

It was unfortunate the happiness didn't extend to the version of the Businessman sitting in his office chair, barking orders and snidely sneering at his computer screen. Maybe he hadn't gotten any the night before and was just taking his pissy attitude out on his underlings. When Ling looked up again the CEO didn't look so stiff anymore. He was grinning widely and blushing at his phone, twisting it this way and that. It looked like he was trying to zoom in on something. Whatever it was, the blushing only worsened with every 'Ping' of his phone. Yao smirked as he stood on his chair to look over the cubicle wall. Li Shang had locked the door and closed the blinds to his office.

Two hours later he emerged, looking extremely flustered and agitated. His top three buttons were undone and his tie was hanging loose around his neck. His shirt looked like it had a few more wrinkles in it than it should have. Mr Li stormed passed Yao and Ling, stopped in the doorway of his secretary's office and demanded she book the soonest possible flight to Minsk she could get. Even if she had to hire someone's private jet and charter a flight, Shang didn't care. He needed to get to Minsk before midnight. When asked why—not that it was any of his secretary's business—he got that menacing glint in his eyes and resolutely stated that, right now, his girlfriend needed him and he needed her too.

Presently, she was trapped in a hotel room that was much too big for one person, in a red lacy basque she refused to undo on her own. And he certainly wasn't the type of boyfriend to let her suffer through that sort of situation without his assistance.


End file.
